BOMA International LA: Parties + Education = No Sleep
What do you get when you combine back-to-back educational sessions, a giant expo, nightly parties, and the great city of Los Angeles? Not much sleep for one thing. You also get a fantastic BOMA International experience. To me, convention highlights this year included a presentation on how property managers can further their careers by effectively selling themselves, and a BAE and Board Education Symposium that changed the way I think about BOMA membership.
Joe Markling, Senior Managing Director at CBRE, delivered a talk titled, “Sales and Presentation Strategies: Creating a Memorable Impression.” The insightful and surprising thing about Joe’s talk was his theory that property managers are in fact selling all the time. They may not be brokering deals but they do have to sell themselves to their customers, and budgets to their asset managers. Everything, says Joe, is a sales pitch. So how do we make the best possible pitch? Preparation, practice, and a really great PowerPoint are good places to start.
The BAE and Board Education symposium was the educational highlight of the convention for me. Led by Paul D. Meyer of Tucker International, this morning-long session invited attendees to think about their members in new ways by raising questions like, “Do our members feel like owners?” “Are our events time wasters or time savers?” “Is our value proposition unique enough to make people choose us over another association?”
The other San Diego chapter and board members who attended BOMA International this year have their own favorite sessions, new ideas, and (potentially) embarrassing stories from the three nights of parties. But one thing is for sure: BOMA San Diego is one of the best chapters out there (and no one will ever top our Opening Party).
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